Got something wrong

Because I couldn't control my thoughts about BC any longer! This story is set at the end of season 2, when the truth about Pippa and Lisa is just a small step away. First storyline is slightly adapted from the original season plot, including some of the lines to refresh your memories.

Summary: DI Hardy has never felt so alive as he did after his surgery, and together with Miller he pushes Lee and Claire Ashworth to their limits. Feeling the fire under them, Lee makes one last risky step to prevent the truth about Pippa and Lisa coming out, tagging Claire along with him. While leaving Hardy to die and misleading Miller, they make a run for it. But they didn't count on the wittiness of DS Miller too eager to track down and bring justice to the couple. But will she be in time to save Hardy? And can she find them without him?

Although still half restless, DI Alec Hardy awakes from the most peaceful sleep he had in months. He almost feels a smile creep onto his face when he hears low chatter from the small living room. He looks to his left and sees his ex-wife and Miller quietly studying several documents on the table in front of them.

"What is going on?" He asks when he tries to sit upright. He gets a slight shock on the left side of his chest and is just able to prevent a yelp to come out of his mouth. Ah, the pacemaker must work. Or is it the ICD? He doesn't know, and actually doesn't care. It works. And he is alive! His trial of thoughts is interrupted by the voice of his ex-wife.

"Good morning, cup of tea?" She probably knows him too well since she already walks towards the kitchen to make him some.

He sees Miller carefully looking at him, a smile half suppressed yet also half visible when she watches him climb out of bed and quite smoothly puts his shirt over his head with only one arm able to do the ask.

"Claire is gone from the house, then I found a pile of ash in the sink, presumably of where she burned the photograph of herself wearing this pendant." To interrupt her trail of thoughts and especially the thought where she is thinking about her DI actually looking good without the look of dead and exhaustion on his face, she starts talking about her latest discovery.

"You mean Pippa's pendant actually belonged to Claire?" He asks with his face one full of surprise.

"Well, Claire was wearing it in the photograph I saw. She must have giving it to Pippa or something."

At that moment, Tess enters the room again and hands a steaming cup of tea to Hardy, all the while touching his back softly. For much too long, is the only thing Ellie can come up with. Hardy hardly seems to notice.

"And now she has burned the photo. She panicking, that's good aye, I like it when they panic." He looks as Tess instead of Ellie. Too eager to not look at the scene before her, Ellie continues her theory.

"But what, Claire kills the girls and Lee covers for her? What would be her motive? Unless she was grooming Pippa for Lee."

"I knew I had seen this name before, Gary Thorp." Tess interrupts the trail of thoughts both other detectives were having.

"You mean as from Thorp Agriservices." Miller tries.

Tess continues "Yeah, but he was also in the invite list for the wedding Ricky and Cate went to, but he never showed up." She wiggles her eyebrows towards Hardy. His expression of surprise hadn't left his face yet.

"So, he knew Ricky and Cate and we never talked to him?"

"There was no connection until now, I will get onto it. And no, we are not reopening the case." Tess looks determined when a sparkle of hope enters Hardy's eyes, a sparkle that again soon disappears. "What you two are gonna do?"

"Miller is gonna give Claire one last chance to confess."

"Am I?" Ellie is not sure whether her former boss is saying this because he trusts her with it, or because he just likes bossing around. She gives up, knowing full well she will end up doing what he asks of her anyway. Because in the end, he is almost always right.

Alec, indeed, has never felt so alive. "Yes. We will set fire under her."

Ellie Miller walks back from the beach to her own house, her old house, after a fiercely conversation with Claire. She didn't think her words made the other woman any closer to confessing, and meanwhile she couldn't stop thinking about the words Claire had said.

"What is the truth bringing us now?"

"Peace for the families, Claire."

"Really? Those parents, of the boy your husband has killed, are they at peace now? No, I didn't think so. I had a life Ellie, and it was destroyed. When is it ever going to stop?"

Are they at peace now? Ellie keeps on twirling and twirling these words over and over again in her head. What was she thinking? Did she really think that her life could go back to normal once Joe had been convicted and would be locked away for years? She really thought the Latimer family could forgive her for sleeping next to the killer for all those months? Keeping him up to date? She missed Beth's friendship so much. But deep in her heart, she knew her life would never come back.

She looked up to the sky right before leaving the beach. This is my life now. Lonely. Bitter, solving other people's problems while her problems just kept piling up and no one left to help her. Joe. Tom. Fred growing up and in need of knowing what happened. She very well knows that Hardy will leave the minute the Sandbrook-case is solved and Joe will be convicted, and although a cow probably has a better human interaction than her former boss did, she would miss him. She would miss him just to banter with, and especially to scold with. The scolding helped. Really helped, actually. But all would be lost soon. There was no way back now.

She quickly turned ahead and headed towards the house, not once looking back again.

The climb upwards to Lee's place in the field was a lighter one, without the constant feeling of exhaustion and pain all over his body. Hardy actually truly enjoyed the walk, and a smile just kept on creeping onto his face. Why didn't I do this surgery sooner again? He almost laughed about his own joke when he came face to face with Lee, whom had seen him coming and had walked towards him with a nasty air of arrogance surrounding him.

"What do you want this time?" Lee asks.

"I actually came to say thank you." Hardy smiled when he saw the look of surprise on his nemesis' face.

"For what?"

"The police of South Mercia have authorized the Sandbrook-case to be reopened. New leads, new evidence, we couldn't have done that without you, all the information you gave me. It won't take long to wrap up now." Hardy sees the way Lee stares at him.

"Are you all right? There is something different about you, fella."

Although Hardy would rather punch him in the face for calling him fella, he doesn't intend to let Lee destroy his hope for salvation and happiness after all.

"I am more than alright Lee, I am reborn. I thought this case would kill me before I had a chance to solve it, not knowing having failed. But then I had an operation. And after that, when I woke up, and I was alive because I didn't expect to be alive, you know the first thing I felt?"

"What?"

"Angry. Really properly angry. For the Gillespie's, for Pippa, for Lisa. I haven't felt that angry in years, that is a beautiful feeling. I was worn out, tired, I was beaten. Now I am again alive. But you, you look exhausted. Sick of running, so sick that you can't escape of what happened. And I get it." The detective in him noticed the slight change in facial expression of the man in front of him.

"You don't get anything about me."

"What I don't get, is whether you are lying to protect yourself or someone else? Because you were with Claire. I always thought she was lying to protect you. Maybe it is the other way around. You can't trust her." Hardy feels Lee is getting angry now too. Exactly what I need.

"You are wrong."

"Am I? Did she ever tell you she was pregnant?" A sting of quilt creeps up on him, knowing he just broke the bond he had with Claire and shattered it to pieces. But hadn't she done so herself as well? He did indeed found out one thing about the woman. She can't be trusted.

"You are lying."

"Why don't you ask her?" And Hardy turns around with the ease of a young man again, leaving behind a startled Lee Ashworth.

After the big fight and many gallons of sea water later, Lee still holds Claire's head and hair firmly in his grip while asking the two most prominent questions he can come up with. Especially the first question triggers him the most.

"How did Alec Hardy knew?" He looks Claire straight in the eye and knows her answer was going to be the truth.

"He came to the clinic with me and stayed with me. He stayed with me." Although Lee sees that Claire's mostly angry with Hardy right now, he can't help it but sees right through that and the adoration of Claire for the detective becomes clear. Claire has been getting fond of the detective then. But how fond? The anger inside of Lee is getting worse by the second. God, how much I hate that detective. He destroyed everything and would have continued so if it wasn't for his stupid wife banging another man.

"Was the baby mine?" Although her next answer is sincere enough, he can't help but feels getting angrier.

"You have to ask that? After everything I have done for you? I don't want you near me."

When he sees here making her way out of the water and away from him, further and further away, Lee reaches his conclusions after so many months of getting away with it all.

He cannot lose Claire. And he cannot go to jail.

DI Alec Hardy patiently waits on the side of the boardwalk while awaiting Lee's arrival. His second meeting with his true enemy in a day now. After Miller's discovery of Lee knowing Lisa much better than he let on, Hardy couldn't control the urge to meet Lee again, giving him one more chance to confess rather than to keep running away. He feels he is closing in on Lee, and he wants him to bloody know it. He barely lifts his head when Lee finally comes into focus. He let the other man start the conversation.

"What does that text mean 'I got something wrong?'"

"Spoken to Claire yet?" Lee grits his teeth.

"What do you want?"

This is the sign for Hardy to start firing questions at him.

"Ever sleep with Lisa Newbery?"

"No."

"You wanted to?"

"No."

"She turned you down?"

"No."

"What did Claire make of you and Lisa?"

"There was no me and Lisa. I barely even spoke to her."

"Right, just slept with her. What is it like to kill someone, Lee? What is it like to be with someone in the room when the life goes out of a person? How does it feel to be responsible for that?"

"I told ya, I don't know."

"I think you do. I look at you as someone who is stained by death. It haunts you every day. Just confess Lee, I'm nearly there anyway."

"I have nothing else to say."

"I think you and Claire have still plenty left to say. I'm gonna make you say it."

When Lee sees Detective Hardy walking away with a pace of a new-born man, he feels like watching his doom coming closer with every step the detective takes. This guy steals the only woman I have ever loved away from me, and will put me behind bars for the rest of my life. When he thinks about it, the chills are running up his spine. He can't. He can't let it happen. This detective needs to be eliminated, and he needs to get away from here. With Claire.

Now determined, Lee starts walking away towards his car and drives towards one other person he still hopes is willing to help him.

He needs to be eliminated.

So, this is it. Chapter one. Mostly a recap of the conversations of the episode, therefore I'll post chapter two immediately, so you'll get a feeling where this story is going.

Of course, let me know if I should continue this story and if you have any thoughts about it :)